Door locks: Where to look for quality reproductions?

[Kern Dog]

The door locks in my '70 Charger are original. The LH side works fine but the right side is AFU.
I looked at a few other cars over the weekend and found that of the ones that work, If you turn the key to the LEFT to the 10:00 position, it bumps the lock rods one way. Turning to the right to the 2:00 position, it turns the lock rods the other way.
Mine should be like that but only the driver side works that way. The right side used to work but at present, it meets resistance to 1:00 while going to the 9:00 position to the left. I suspect the lever on the lock itself is messed up but no matter, the lock rods don't move enough to lock or unlock.
If I decide to go with new locks, I'd appreciate a suggestion for what vendor to call. Maybe they are all made by one company, I just don't know.
Also, who knows if new locks are able to be reconfigured to match the ignition key pattern like the original locks are? I'd prefer to have them match.
Thanks...

 

[YY1]

Silly question-

Did you lube the hell out of it?

 

[toolmanmike]

Silly question-

Did you lube the hell out of it?

Kern Dog should know about "lube".

 

[eldubb440]

he poo-pooed my jar of Vaseline

 

[toolmanmike]

Greg, unless there are broken parts, the mechanism is just gooed up. I would spray and soak it with brake and parts cleaner and/or Deep Creep and start working it.

 

[eldubb440]

the problem is likely in the latch

 

[Kern Dog]

I've had trouble with this lock since I've owned it. It never opened or closed the lock with authority. The lever may have too much wear on the inside where the cylinder presses it. It has always been clean and lubed properly and the car is not driven in heavy rain.
I usually prefer to fix the original stuff rather than replace it.

 

[devinism]

I would remove the door trim panel and eyeball it while a helper (we all have those, right?) uses your key in the lock cylinder. Are you seeing any slop? If you pop the clip off of the cylinder and manually move the rod up and down does it work correctly (door latch in the closed position)? With the rod off does the lock cylinder have a lot more free play in one direction?

 

[Kern Dog]

When operated by hand from inside, the RH lock does not move as smoothly as the left does. It never has which makes me wonder if the lever got worn even more from fighting the resistance. It works but it could be better.

 

[devinism]

When operated by hand from inside, the RH lock does not move as smoothly as the left does. It never has which makes me wonder if the lever got worn even more from fighting the resistance. It works but it could be better.

The latch, or the lock cylinder?

 

[jimbosride]

You may want to go with NOS parts, allot of them are sold with the ignition unit.

 

[gtx6970]

Open the door up.
Make sure no bent link rods or heavy wear in the circular link 'clip' that actuates said link rod
soak lock cyl and door latch in simple green or maybe even carb cleaner
Lube it good will probably fix it

 

[Kern Dog]

The latch, or the lock cylinder?

I’ll be home in a bit and be able to get this apart to get pictures. I think I have two things going on at the same time: Linkage that isn’t working properly and a lock cylinder with too much play at the end. The result is that turning the key results in too much lost motion before moving the linkage enough to operate the lock mechanism.

 

[gtx6970]

The oblong arm rides on the back of the cylinder. Can get worn inside

 

[Kern Dog]

Yes sir, It is the arm and the lever in the cylinder that I think is worn. I'll try to dig into it today.

 

[Kern Dog]

With the help of you guys, I completed a NO COST fix.
I thought that the lever on the end of the cylinder might have been worn and sloppy. The door panel off and inside…

By hand from inside, everything seems to move freely and properly.

With the key in, I can see that the rods move but not quite enough. With the lock out…

The lever does have some wear.

I have several original locks here so I took one and swapped levers.

That helped some but what also did was adjusting this:

Those two 3/8” screws to the right of the latch..

With these two changes, the key works. The range of turn is further than the door on the left side. I’m still turning the key almost 90 degrees each direction to move the lock but it does work…and it was FREE.
Thanks again guys!

 

[YY1]

That moved your fulcrum and shortened the travel.

Good job!